Barbara Murphy: Here are a few new Murphy's Laws

Barbara Murphy

Friday

Apr 20, 2012 at 12:01 AMApr 20, 2012 at 8:16 PM

For instance: If faced with the choice of whether to eat a salad with fat-free dressing or go for the gold and order a piece of chocolate chip cheesecake while out to dinner, always order the cheesecake. You could walk out of the restaurant and get nailed by an 18-wheeler while crossing the parking lot.

Last week, I received a phone call from an old friend. She had been going through some of her mother’s things and had come across a Murphy’s Law wall hanging that was made in Ireland.

She immediately thought of me and decided to take it to the newspaper office to give me. Since I’m never there (I do my columns from home), she left it in their care for me to pick up when I was in the area.

After finally making it down there last Friday, I retrieved it, but I didn’t get a chance to unwrap and examine it until yesterday. It’s a keeper!

Of course, the first and most important Murphy’s Law, as everyone knows, is: If anything can go wrong, it will!

However, this wall hanging has a long list of other Murphy’s Laws, some of which I had never heard before. But once I had read them, I agreed that they, too, apply to everyday living. I thought you all might enjoy hearing some of them and getting my slant on how they apply to my life and probably yours.

Of course, after listing the first and most famous law, the very next law on this wall hanging is also a familiar one. Everyone knows that: Anything good in life is either illegal or immoral –– or fattening. I’ve learned a long time ago that in order to have a lot of good memories in your golden years, it’s also necessary to adopt my own theory on life to go along with this one.

My own adaptation of that law is: It’s better to be sorry for something I’ve done, than for something I didn’t do!

For instance: If faced with the choice of whether to eat a salad with fat-free dressing or go for the gold and order a piece of chocolate chip cheesecake while out to dinner, always order the cheesecake. You could walk out of the restaurant and get nailed by an 18-wheeler while crossing the parking lot.

As I always say: It could happen!

I really like this next one: The light at the end of the tunnel is probably the headlamp of an oncoming train, or a sure sign that you might need a new roof on your house.

Here’s one that’s probably too late for most of us to profit by: Never sleep with anyone crazier than yourself. Wow! Where were these Murphy’s Laws when I was 19 and didn’t know any better?

Here’s one we should embroider on a wall hanging and give to our teenage sons and grandsons: Beauty is only skin deep; ugly goes all the way to the bone. It would save a lot of grief for them down the road.

How about this one? If everything seems to be going well, you obviously don’t have a clue as to what’s really going on. (I cleaned that one up a bit.)

Here’s one I can vouch for: A shortcut is the longest distance between two points.

One time, after visiting my son at his farm in Charlotte County, Va., he gave me directions to a shortcut that would bring us out in Moorefield, W.Va. It was the longest shortcut I ever took! (That was before GPS units became popular.)

I like this one, and it’s true! Never argue with a fool; people might not know the difference. I’ve always ascribed to a version of this that my dad taught us: It’s better to sit down and be thought a fool than to stand up and be known as one. And he was right!

This one is near and dear to my heart: The other line always moves faster. To that I would add: If you change lines, the one you just got out of speeds up and the one you moved to stops completely, probably because it’s time for the person behind the counter to go to lunch. You know I speak the truth here!

Murphy’s Golden Rule is: Whoever makes the gold makes the rules. We women are all too familiar with this one since women, no matter how good they are at their jobs, never make as much money as their husbands or partners. Perhaps that’s why marriage is not as popular as it used to be. I’m just saying …

Anything you try to fix will take longer and cost more than you thought. If you’ve ever purchased a fixer-upper and thought that you’d be able to turn it into a palace for a song, you’ll have this law carved in wood and hung above the fireplace.

Perhaps my favorite one is: No matter how long and hard you shop for an item, after you’ve bought it, it will go on sale somewhere else for a cheaper price. To this one I might add: You always have one friend that tells you where you could have purchased it for half the cost, after you’ve already bought it! What would we do without these kinds of “friends” in our lives?

And last, but certainly not least: In order to get a loan, you must first prove that you don’t need one. We’ve all been there, too!

I am so glad that somebody liked this column enough to bestow this wonderful piece of memorabilia on me! I am having it framed and put right above my bed so that I can read it each morning while making it. (My bed, that is.)

Thank you, Francine, for thinking of me! You’re still one of the prettiest May Day Queens to ever reign!

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